Undercurrents in Broad Daylight

The blue light of the stun gun danced at the fingertips of Shiina Hiyori, making the smile at the corner of her mouth appear all the more sinister. Lin Yuan took a half-step back, his lower back pressing against the cold filing cabinet, the sharp metal edges digging into him painfully. This was the first time since his transmigration that he had felt genuine fear—not only did she know his secret, but she even spoke the word "transmigrator" with such natural ease.

"How long have you been monitoring me?" He forced himself to speak, his right hand quietly reaching for the pen in his pocket. It was a tactical pen he had "borrowed" from the desk of Katsuragi Kohei last week, its tip coated with anesthetic.

"Monitoring?" Shiina tilted her head, her silver hair sliding over her shoulder with the movement. "When you teased Karuizawa Kei with that 'postpartum care for sows' nonsense, the alarm in the monitoring room went off." She suddenly pressed forward, the stun gun nearly touching Lin Yuan's Adam's apple. "Did you know? Every classroom in this school is equipped with brainwave monitors, and you..." She licked her lips. "Your fluctuation frequency is exactly the same as that transfer student who fell to his death half a year ago."

Lin Yuan's pupils constricted. Memories flashed through his mind like sharp blades—on the day of the entrance ceremony, he had seen faded caution tape in the corner of the old school building, and the security guard had muttered about "another poor soul who had a mental breakdown." It turned out that long before he arrived, this body had already been harboring a fatal flaw.

"Clang—"

The crisp sound of metal hitting the floor broke the stalemate. Shiina looked down by reflex, and Lin Yuan seized the chance to throw the pen. The anesthetic needle grazed her earlobe and embedded itself in the wall. The moment the girl stumbled back, he grabbed the file folder on the floor and smashed it into the stun gun.

"Crash!"

Paper documents flew everywhere, and Lin Yuan knocked open the ventilation duct grate and scrambled inside. Shiina's cold laugh came from behind him: "It's useless. All exits have facial recognition systems installed, you..."

Her voice suddenly cut off. Through a gap in the duct, Lin Yuan caught a glimpse of an incredible sight—a ghostly blue barcode lit up on the back of Shiina's neck, and her entire body froze like a puppet with cut strings, her pupils dilating into an inorganic gray.

The next morning, Lin Yuan stood in front of a vending machine, the sound of a canned coffee rolling down making his temples throb. He had crawled through the ducts for forty minutes last night, finally escaping through the ceiling of the swimming pool locker room. His shirt was still covered in cobwebs, but what concerned him more was a new anonymous text message on his phone:

"Come to the Third Greenhouse during lunch break. Regarding your missing system."

The greenhouse was filled with the humid scent of plants. The moment Lin Yuan pulled back the plastic curtain, he froze in place. Ichinose Honami was crouching among the orchids, her uniform jacket draped casually over the back of a chair, revealing a brand-new electronic patch on the back of her neck—identical to the barcode on Shiina Hiyori.

"You really came." She turned and smiled, her fingertips brushing the dew on a petal. "Don't be nervous, this is just a cognitive corrector." Seeing Lin Yuan remain silent, she suddenly untied the ribbon at her collar, revealing a gruesome surgical scar below her collarbone. "The car accident three months ago... it wasn't actually an accident."

Lin Yuan finally understood the meaning of those files. The so-called "social experiment" was a plan to transform problem students into perfect vessels. Because Ichinose had displayed extraordinary empathy during mock exams, she had been labeled "Subject E-047"; and Shiina Hiyori was the cleaner responsible for purging those who awakened.

"The 'original personality' you see is our instinct fighting against the brainwashing." Ichinose handed him a tablet; on the screen was a scan of his brain, with the hippocampus area flashing an eerie red. "As for your system... it isn't malfunctioning at all; it was simply shielded by the chairman using an electromagnetic pulse."

Lin Yuan suddenly recalled the stinging sensation on the back of his neck during the entrance physical. It turned out that the so-called vaccine chip was the true shackle.

"Why tell me all this?" He narrowed his eyes.

Ichinose suddenly grabbed his wrist with surprising strength. "Because you are a variable!" Her eyes surged with a near-manic hope. "During last week's math test, you used advanced Huaxia formulas to solve the problems, right? That kind of algorithm doesn't exist in this world, so..."

The door to the greenhouse burst open. Horikita Manabu strode in, followed by members of the student council. The tablet in his hand was playing the surveillance footage from the basement last night. "What a pity," he said, adjusting his reflective glasses. "Subject E-047 and anomalous individual A-000, you are now under arrest for violating Article 39 of the school regulations."

In the special confinement room at dusk, Lin Yuan stared at his reflection in the one-way glass. His system interface suddenly flickered, and a line of blood-red warning text emerged from the fragmented data stream:

"Host personality fusion detected at 91%. Initiate final protocol?"

A heavy thud came from the room next door. Through the ventilation duct, he saw Ichinose curled up in the corner, sparks flying from her electronic patch. The girl mouthed silently: "They... are going to format..."

Lin Yuan gritted his teeth and pressed the confirmation key deep within his consciousness. Agonizing pain pierced his skull like steel needles, and countless memory fragments surged forth—the days and nights Ayanokoji Kiyotaka spent training in the White Room, the early mornings Lin Yuan spent binge-watching anime as a shut-in, and a figure wearing a fox mask whispering in the void: "The so-called perfect human is nothing but..."

"Bang!"

The door to the confinement room was violently kicked open. Karuizawa Kei stood in the backlight holding a fire axe, followed by a gloomy-looking Ryuen Kakeru. "Don't get the wrong idea!" she said, kicking a guard aside. "I just couldn't stand the thought of someone else destroying this school before I did!"

A piercing alarm suddenly rang out at the end of the corridor, and the chairman's cold voice came over the broadcast: "Attention all students and faculty, emergency purge procedure initiated."

Lin Yuan looked out the window; the sunset was falling, and a brand-new interface appeared on his retina—above a deep blue progress bar, it clearly read:

"Personality reconstruction complete. Loading combat module."

Lin Yuan gritted his teeth and pressed the confirm button deep within his consciousness. Excruciating pain pierced his skull like steel needles, and countless memory fragments surged forth—the days and nights Ayanokoji Kiyotaka spent training in the White Room, the early mornings Lin Yuan, a Chinese otaku, spent binge-watching anime, and a figure wearing a fox mask whispering in the void: "The so-called perfect human is nothing more than..."

"Bang!"

The door to the solitary confinement room was violently kicked open. Karuizawa Kei stood in the backlight holding a fire axe, with a gloomy-faced Ryuen Kakeru following behind her. "Don't get the wrong idea!" She kicked the guard at her feet aside. "I just couldn't stand the thought of someone else destroying this school before I did!"

A piercing alarm suddenly rang out at the end of the corridor, and the cold voice of the Chairman came over the broadcast: "Attention all students and faculty, emergency purge protocol is now being initiated."

Lin Yuan looked out the window as the sunset fell, and a brand-new interface appeared on his retina—above a deep blue progress bar, it clearly read:

Personality reconstruction complete, beginning to load combat modules.